More than twenty-five years ago, Jonathan Pollard, a U.S. Navy intelligence analyst, was convicted of spying for Israel. Ever since, Israel has been trying to free him.

Some in the United States also have doubted whether Pollard should remain in
jail, because, after all, he had "only" been spying for a cherished
US ally. However, instead of questioning whether Pollard should be behind bars,
perhaps proponents of his release instead should be questioning the cozy US
relationship with Israel.

US underwriting of Israeli security has only made that country more intransigent
against making peace by returning land it seized by attacking its Arab neighbors
in 1967. Now, the Obama administration, led by the crusading Secretary of State
John Kerry, is now thinking about releasing Pollard to motivate Israel to extend
essentially stalled peace talks with the Palestinians and perhaps make some
ill-defined "concessions."

Essentially, the Obama administration seeks to replicate what the Carter administration did with the Camp David accords in the late 1970s: pay parties to do what is in their long term interest to do anyway – make peace. Ironically, the continuing lavish military aid to Israel, which was hiked back then to buy the Camp David deal, is emboldening Israel to resist the concessions required to make peace with the Palestinians today. Adding Pollard’s release to the Israeli pot of gold likely would not make Israel more likely to give back the West Bank and resettle Palestinian refugees uprooted by past wars in the Middle East; the hawkish Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would likely just pocket the concession and continue his unyielding obstructionism.

Understandably, the betrayed US intelligence community has always vehemently
opposed Pollard’s release. In fact, the normally sycophantic then-CIA Director
George Tenet actually threatened to resign if then-President Bill Clinton freed
Pollard to get a modest Middle East deal.

And what an injustice that the Obama administration is actively trying to extradite
and prosecute whistle-blower Edward Snowden – whose likely motive was only to
curb excessive National Security Agency spying, both abroad and more importantly
on Americans at home in defense of the Constitution’s Fourth Amendment – while
contemplating freeing Pollard, whose disloyalty to his country benefited himself monetarily and a foreign power.

Not only should the Obama administration refrain from releasing Pollard – in what likely would be a vain attempt to resuscitate dying peace talks in which neither the Israelis nor the Palestinians really want to reach an agreement – but should cut or terminate the more than $ 3 billion annual military aid to Israel. The latter might actually motivate Israel, out of necessity, to get more serious about making peace.

Whether it does or not, however, US security does not require an Israeli-Palestinian
peace deal. US incessant attempts to broker such an agreement arise out of domestic
political concerns and often make things worse in the region.

Not only stop funding israel's genocide of the Palestinian people but divert those funds to rebuild Palestine. Pollard is a powerful tool for the US, let's use him israeli style. Promise to release him if israel accepts a Palestinian state. Then renege on the promise. Usually Obama and Kerry are usually great at lying.

Pollard should spend every minute of his life in prison. It is apartheid Israel that should be held in solitary confinement, and isolation until it gives up it's Nazi like leibenstraum designs on Palestine, and its neighbors, and withdraw to the pre 67 lines.